captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions >> woodruff: law enforcemen officials say the surviving suspect in the boston bombings has admitted he did play a role in the attacks, and they believe he and his brother acted alone. good evening. i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill. on the newshour tonight, we get the latest on the investigation, and the condition of dzhokar tsarnaev, upgraded today to fair. >> woodruff: plus, jeffrey brown examines the lessons learned for public safety officials about security at big events and gatherings. >> ifill: then, a powerful

democrat, montana's max baucus, is the eighth senator to say he won't seek reelection next year. we look at why democrats are worried. >> woodruff: fred de sam lazaro reports on gender bias in india, where many parents still opt for baby boys over girls. >> the gap began to wideen in the '90s with new ultrasound machines that made it easy to learn a fetus's sex. this scans have led to the termination of millions of female pregnancies. >> ifill: and margaret warner talks with the author of a new book about shadow warfare waged by the c.i.a. and special forces. >> a week after 9/11 president bush gave the c.i.a. lethal authority to capture and kill al qaeda members so they become much more into the killing business and the military. >> woodruff: that's all ahead on tonight's newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by:

moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> and by the bill and melinda gates foundation. dedicated to the idea that all people deserve the chance to live a healthy, productive life. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

>> woodruff: new details emerged today in the investigation of two chechen-american brothers in the boston bombings. and as authorities worked to build their case, two more victims of the city's week of terror were laid to rest. family and friends paid final respects today as funerals for m.i.t. police officer sean collier and eight-year-old martin richard. at the same time, the medical condition of the surviving suspect-- 19-year-old dzhokhar tsarnaev-- was upgraded to fair from serious. he's now facing federal charges that he and his older brother tamerlan planted pressure cooker bombs near the finish line for the boston marathon. tamerlan later died after a shootout with police. in providence, rhode island, lawyers for tamerlan tsarnaev's wife catherine said she had been

unaware of the bombing plot. >> the reports of involvement by her husband and brother-in-law came as an absolute shock to them all. as a mother, a sister, a daughter, a wife, katie deeply mourns the pain and loss to innocent victims, students, law enforcement officers, families and our community. in the aftermath of this tragedy she, her daughter and her family are trying to come to terms with this event. >> woodruff: meanwhile, both the "washington post" and the "new york times" have reported that the younger tsarnaev admitted his role in the attack. the "post" also reported he told investigators that u.s. involvement in the iraq and afghanistan wars were motivating factors. other accounts said there appeared to be no links to

larger terrorist groups. in russia today, their mother said f.b.i. agents talked to her about tamerlan tsarnaev's trip back home last year, but she told them he was no radical. >> what happened is a terrible thing. but i know that my kids had nothing to do with it. i know it. i'm a mother. i have -- you know, i know my kids. i know my kids. i really -- my kids would never get involved in anything like that. >> woodruff: back in boston, there were mixed feelings today among people returning to homes and businesses along reopened sections of boylston street, the site of the bombings. >> i don't want to get in anyone's way, you know? it's pretty weird being back here. i don't really know what to do. >> it's fantastic, yeah. it feels like home. we're ready for it to be busy

again. >> reporter: get back to normal? >> exactly. >> reporter: at the same time, the boston public health commission upped the number of people injured in the marathon bombing from 180 to 264. the new total takes into account individuals who delayed treatment for minor injuries. 51 of the victims remain hospitalized. this amp, boston mayor tom menino announced the biggest charitable fund for the bombing victims, the one fund, is up to $20 million so far. corporate donors committed $15 million, the rest came from some 50,000 indivuals. payments ar expected to be distributed starting in july. we have more now on some of the questions surrounding the investigation and what's been learned in the last 24 hours. i spoke with devlin barrett of the "wall street journal" a short time ago. devlin barrett, welcome. let me ask you first about this younger brother dzhokhar. we know that he's in the hospital bed communicating.

what do we know about his injuries and how he's communicating with investigators. >> his medical condition is upgraded from serious to fair, which means that he is improving but he still has some pretty major injuries which are affecting his ability to communicate. specifically he's been shot in the head, some sort of head wound, also a pretty serious gunshot wound to the neck which is affecting his throat and also he's got gunshot wounds to his leg and his hand. so our understanding of it is he can basically communicate by writing a little and by nodding and a little bit of sort of grunting yes or no at times but it's very limited ishat'seen descbed to us. >> woodruff: what have you learned about what he's saying to them? what he's communicating. >> we're told he's tell his f.b.i. questioners that he and his brother acting alone. that they did so out of a

jihadist sentiment, an anti-american sentiment, but that they weren't directed by anyone, certainly not a terror group overseas. and he's also told them that there aren't any other bombs and there aren't any other bombers out there that they have to worry about. now, what i'm tolds invesgators aren't tang y of that at face value, but so far they have not found other evidence to prove those assertions wrong. >> woodruff: and what's your understanding of whether he has taken responsibility for what's happened? >> what we've been told is that he essentially acknowledges his role in this. there are differing accounts of how much of the direction he cites to his brother, i think that's failed to be determined, but he acknowledges that he essentially did this and was part of this. >> woodruff: and that's what i want to talk to you about because there have been reports that he is saying in so many words and communicating to investigators that this was mainly his brother's idea.

that his older brother was the driving force here. >> i've seen those reports and i'll be honest, that's not how it's been described to me. i think we also have to be careful in when you'll hear different things. that's going to be a big part of the legal fight over this guy's ultimate sentence. he's facing the death penalty. one of the -- maybe the on mititingactor for him in all thimay be that if he's able to claim that he was essentially a pawn or a tool of his older brother. i think, frankly, whatever the truth is, it's going to take more than his word to determine it. >> woodruff: but in so many words he's saying they were not in connection with outside group bus they were that they were looking at jihadist web sites? >> right. this seems to be -- everything he's telling them and everything the f.b.i. has found so far suggests the classic nightma scenario for counterterrism officials which is

self-motivated, self-indoctrine nated and self-trained essentially. that doesn't mean that they won't find something in the course of the investigation that points to some direction or training or ideological involvement by another party, but right now what they have is two young men who seem to have taken it upon themselves to conduct some pretty atrocious acts of violence. >> woodruff: devlin, it's been repoed that investigators are lking to the widow of the older brother tamerlan. what's known about what she's saying? >> that's a very interesting piece to this case because one of the things investigators are trying to determine is did anyone either wittingly or unwittingly help them accomplish this? and the widow has been an interesting focus for the bureau for a number of days because she immediately got a lawyer and the lawyer has been negotiating terms for her to come in and talk and i believe that

conversation began today and i think that's someone that the f.b.i. has been very interested in tlkng to and really wants to understand better what that relationship was, what she saw or didn't see, and what-the-shaugt or didn't think once the attacks happened. >> pelley: and we know that her attorney is saying she didn't know anything about it. do you know who else they are talking to? >> well, they're talking to basically every single person who ever had contact with them. i know another piece of this that they're looking at is the older brother, there are records showing that the older brother purchased some fairly large pieces of fireworks in new hampshire. we've been told by experts that, in theory, you could take out the black powder from those fireworks and, if you had a whole bunch of them-- certainly more than there are records for the brother purchasing-- but if you had a bunch of other purchases you could amass enough black powder, technically, to build these types of bombs. it's just an avenue the f.b.i. is pursuing at this point.

they think it's possible that that's where the black powder for these bombs came from but they also haven't ruled out other potential sources for the black powder such as gun powder or other things. >> woodruff: devlin barrett with the "wall street journal," we thank you. >> thank you. >> ifill: coming up, more on the boston story, including a look at what it takes to secure public spaces. plus, another senator announces plans to retire; the gap between the number of boy and girl babies in india; and the blurred lines between spies and soldiers. but first, with the other news of the day, here's hari sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: a mississippi man accused of sending ricin- tainted letters to president obama and a senator was released on bond today. paul kevin curtis went free a day after an f.b.i. agent testified that authorities found no incriminating evidence at his home. >> the last seven days staring at four gray walls like "green, green grass of home" not really

knowing what's happening and not having a clue why i'm there, just being in a state of overwhelmd is the best way i can describe it. when you've been charged with something and you just -- you never heard of ricin or whatever. i thought they said rice and i said "i don't even eat rice." >> sreenivasan: meanwhile, federal agents searched the home of a second mississippi man today. and another package, possibly containing ricin, was found at a military mail facility in washington. the two suspects accused of plotting to derail a passenger train in canada had their initial court appearances today. both men denied the allegations, and one said he has been unfairly accused. canadian investigators say the pair received "direction and guidance" from al-qaeda elements in iran. but a spokesman for iran's foreign ministry rejected the claim. >> ( tranated ) no firm evidence has been released regarding the individuals who are claimed to have been arrested in canada. views of extremist groups--

especially al qaeda-- have no compatibility with iran either politically or ideologically. we oppose any terrorist and violent action that would jeopardize the lives of innocent people. >> sreenivasan: the two suspects are not canadian citizens, but authorities have not named their home countries. they have been under surveillance since last fall, when members of toronto's muslim community tipped off police. the u.s. secretary of homeland security argued today that immigration reform would help prevent terrorism. opponents of the bill are trying to slow its progress in the wake of the boston bombings. but at a senate hearing, janet napolitano said people here illegally might come forward for a chance at citizenship, making immigration control more effective. >> the existing bill builds on that and one of the important things, the existing bill does, quite frankly from a law enforcement perspective is bringing all of the people out of the shadows who are currently in the shadows.

>> sreenivasan: the brothers who allegedly carried out the boston bombings came to the u.s. from chechnya about ten years ago and received asylum. the murder trial of an abortion provider in philadelphia took a sudden turn today. a state court judge dismissed charges that dr. kermit gosnell murdered three babies during late-term abortions. prosecutors alleged that he killed them after they were born alive. gosnell still faces charges he murdered four other babies, as well as a patient who died after an abortion. in iraq, at least 56 people died after government forces raided a sunni protest camp before dawn. the raid spked fierceiging n hawi, about 160 miles north of baghdad. later, militants stormed a nearby army post, where six other people were killed. news of the violence also led to clashes elsewhere between sunni demonstrators and police. there were new accusations from israel today that syria is using chemical weapons against rebels. in tel aviv, a senior military official said visual evidence shows that government forces has engaged in chemical attacks more than once.

the latest was last month, near damascus. >> ( translated ): to the best of our professional understanding, the regime used lethal chemical weapons against militants on a number of occasions in the past few months including the most reported incident on march 19. the people having foam coming out of their mouths and that shows in our eyes they made use of lethal chemical weapons. which chemical weapons? probably sarin. >> sreenivasan: britain and france announced in march they had evidence assad was using chemical weapons. president obama has said any such action would be a "game changer." but a white house spokesman said today the u.s. still wants to see conclusive evidence. france has become the latest country to legalize same-sex marriage. the legislation easily passed today, after a disruption on the floor of the national assembly. the assembly president had a protester ejected, and the vote went ahead. this came after weeks of demonstrations against the proposal and an increase in hate crimes against gays. france has had civil unions since 1999.

the wealth gap in america has widened even more. a pew research center report finds the wealthiest 7% of americans grew even richer during the first two years of the economic recovery. at the same time, the average net worth for the remaining 93% was down. part of the explanation is that the wealthy hold more stocks that increased in value. the findings were based on u.s. census data. wall street briefly plunged today after a fake "tweet" said there had been explosions at the white house, and the president had been wounded. it turned out someone had hacked twitter accounts of the associated press, and posted the bogus message. the securities and exchange commission planned to look into the incident. stos quickly recovered, and theow jones industrial average gained 152 points to close above 14,719. the nasdaq rose more than 35 points to close at 3269. those are some of the day's major stories. now, back to gwen. >> ifill: and we come back to the boston story. last week's bombings sparked new

interest in beefing up security at large public gatherings from street fairs to sports competitions. jeffrey brown looks into that. >> brown: the question after the events of last week: how safe can we ever be? especially in major cities. thousands of people gathered in public buildings or for big events. it's a question that was posed after the 1995 oklahoma city bombing that killed 168. and a year later, after a pipe bomb exploded in atlanta's centennial olympic park during the summer games, killing one and injuring 111. 9/11, of course, brought a ratcheting up of security measures including among much else, the creation of the department of homeland security and the t.s.a. and surveillance cameras watching for suspicious activities. and there have been examples of thwarted attacks on public spaces, notably in 2010. the car bomb in new york city's

time square was disabled after two street vendors reported the smoking vehicle to police. since 2003, homeland security's urban area security initiative grants have funneled billions of dollars to major cities for anti-terrorism training and equipment. security experts will now study boston for lessons learned for future public gatherings. just just one small example: national otballeague officials said today that they're increasing security for this week's player draft, to be held at new york's radio city music hall. and we look at these issues now with jim davis, executive director of the colorado department of public safety. he's also chair of the national governor's association homeland security advisors council. among big events he's worked on was the 2008 democratic national convention in denver. and ed cannon, currently of t&m protection resources, a private security consulting firm. he was formerly an assistant chief of the new york city police dartment, andelped set up security for that city's

marathon and many other events. well, jim davis, starting with you, how does boston change things for people in your position? what kinds of discussions are going on now? >> well, certainly we're much more focused on security. you know, in the united states we've got pretty short memories and i think after 9/11 we were very focused on security and then things kind of we'd go through a time period where we don't a lot of attacks or any successful attacks and now bostonhappens and people get focused on it again. i think that in the -- in law enforcement and intelligence community we've always been focused on it but people are going to be more receptive to security measures now and more focused on making sure that major events are safer. >> brown: ed cannon, explain how this works. take something you have worked on, perhaps the new york city marathon, for example. what kind of measures go into

it? how much preparation? how much thinking and how might that change if at all now? >> well, jeff, the new york city marathon is going to be examined with lessons learned from what occurred last week in boston. think about it, 26.2 miles of a route is a very difficult area to effectively secure and police. so what we need to recognize is what a terrorist mind-set is, what do they consider to be a high-value target and their goals are to stke at someing tht's iconic, such as the world trade center, such as the murrah building, such as the boston marathon. and they also want to inflict as many casualties as they possibly can and, lastly, they're looking to have an economic impact as well. so when you think about a marathon and thinking of what have a terrorist's goals are, we

would focus primarily because we have finite security resources, we would focus on those areas that are most crowded. specifically the starting line and the fnish lin and think what we're going to see is as we've seen at venues post-9/11 where there's going to be additional screening adown what we see at times square awe new year's eve with folks before they get into times square needed to be screened by officers and as in ballparks prevented from carrying in backpacks, briefcases, other large packages. we're going to rely heavily on the commitment of the civilian population to go along the lines of if you see methngay something and be more attentive. sort of like they do in israel which has been living for decades in this type of threat. if you leave an unattended package in an airport or bus or train station in israel, it won't be long before a civilian will announce it to the others

around them and to law enforcement that there is that unattended package. so there's going to be a combination. >> pelley: jim davis, one obvious question is can we ever guarantee protection? can we ever guarantee that something like this doesn't happen given all of the kinds of things we just heard about? >> i think we absolutely cannot guarantee it. so -- but, you know, the challenge is to make sure that the event is as secure as possible while also allowing for people to enjoy the event. you know, people expect to be able to participate in a marathon. or they expect to be able to go to a football game and enjoy that event and still have a feeling of security. so it really is a challenge for law enforcement to make sure thatou're doing what youan to secure the event while also allowing people the freedom to really enjoy it.

>> brown:s where that line? because it's enjoyment, it's convenience, there are obvious civil liberties issues that can come up. where do you draw the line? >> well, it's a continuum and a lot of it has to do with what people expect so, for example, national football league, they look at all the bags that all the spectators bring in bags, security will look through your bags, they'll pat people down as they come into the venue. and that is what people expect now from the n.f.l. it's -- you know, if you want to get into the game you've got to follow those procedures. so i think that it has a lot to do with people's expectations. certainly after something like boston i think people are going to be more willing to have security measures, more strenuous, more invasive security measures. but, again, you know, this is the united states and we've got to protect people's freedoms.

d their civil liberties. >> brown: go ahead. >> if i could follow up on jim's point, which is an excellent point that there needs to be a balance between security and people's right to enjoy their everyday lives to do business, to go to school, to enjoy the freedoms that this country has to offer the entire world, but i think what we're facing now is a new type of threat. the government has put in place a rada if you will,that will identify large scale attacks such as the murrah attack or the world trade center attacks when they're in the planningtor very early operational stages. so now the threat we're faced with is more of a lone wolf or small style such as the brothers in boston who are involved in low tech, low cost but high consequence aacks so we do

have to become more involved in some of these more thorough screenings before we come into venues. also the use of technology. closed circuit television systems can be adjusted so as to recognize -- to be able to recognize things that are unusual so if there's a isolated location and someone enters that location the cameras can be trained or programmed, i should say, with rules that will recognize that and senan alert. if bagis dropped and left in a location for a particular amount of time, the video analytics will recognize that and send an alert. and to your question as to when does it become too much, this type of surveillance, these types of screenings, things like that the courts will let us know. the courts have always let police, let law enforcement

agencys if they've gone too far and crossed the line. >> pelley:. >> brown: okay, ed cannon, jim davis, thank you both very much. >> thank you. >> brown: find out how much money different metropotan areas-includinboston hav receivefrom the dartmt of homeland security. there's a graphic on our home page. >> ifill: now, new developments in the upcoming battle for control of the senate. montana democrat max baucus surprised capitol hill today by announcing he will not seek reelection when his term ends next year. that makes him the eighth senator, and the sixth democrat, to step aside this year. the two republicans hold safe red seats in nebraska and georgia. and three of the democrats are from states president obama carried last fall. but the rest are toss-ups that may cost democrats control of the senate in 2014. plus, four more incumbent democrats-- from north carolina,

arkansas, louisiana, and alaska-- are considered vulnerable. so, can one senator's decision change the political landscape? for that, we turn to stuart rothenberg of the rothenberg political report and amy walter of the cook political report. good to have you both here. what's your answer to the question, new >> i think it changes the map a little bit. there are four seats right off the top that republans are very optimistic about. two open in south dakota and west virginia and then the two democratic senators from the south, mary landrieu in louisiana and mark pry your in arkansas. getting dwloond is the challenge. not to say the republicans will win any or all of those but they have a pretty good chance. so the question is can they broaden the playing field. montana is an important addition. they need to put these other seats-- as you mentioned, alaska north carolina-- into play. >> ifill: and max baucus -- >> he's the chairman of a very, very important finance committee and he's been around for 30 years. these folks who are retiring, they've been committee chairman, been in congress for 30 or more

years. the interesting thing about open seats is no party wants to have an open seat. they are usually tougher to defend. but in the case of montana it may be a better situation for democrats if democrats are able to get the candidate that they're all talking about right now, brian schweitzer, the former governor of that state, left office very popular. he is the quintessential montana democrat. fill frill they going after him? >> oh, they most certainly will be going after him. if they get -- if schweitzer is in that position, he runs as the governor, not as a 30-year incumbent with a long voting record. especially on more controversial votes like health care. >> that is a washington figure but he's a goold old boy. he's very charismatic and very montana. >> ifill: he knows how to rock a boat at times. >> he does. >> ifill: in a more general sense, what is tipping or could be tipping the balance? >> well, i think there are individual reasons. for some of them it's health. jay rockefellert's a and

health. i think for mike johann, a republican from nebraska, a younger man in his early '60s i'm not sure the senate was an ideal fit for him. but for a lot of these, as amy pointed out, a lot of these members are very senior, five of the eight are over 70. five of the eight have served five terms or more. so, you know, there are cycles in american politics and democrats are hit regular tirplt in a partilarly difficult class, not an ideal time for them. >> and politics is all about timing and republicans are hoping that the third time is the charm here. 2010, 2012, stu and i would have come in here and said "boy, the map looks really bad for democrats, they could lose control of the senate." and then those years unfolded and 2010 was the year of the tea party but it was also the year where republicans nominated terrible candidates. n states they were supposed to win.

twelve we, of course, had the infamous todd akin in missouri and richard newshour dock in indiana. so five seats that they lost. >> ifill: are there any republican seats being vacated where republicans are at a disadvantage? >> not at a disadvantage. i suppose -- i mean, that was scenario for democrats to compete in georgia. a very crowded republican field. if one of the less broadly acceptable republicans like congressman paul brown, for example, were to be the nominee i think democrats would think we have an opportunity. they are recruiting candidates. they're either recruiting congressman barrow of georgia. a democrat is going to be a very strong candidate as a member of the house and they're recruiting sam nunnen's daughter. so democrats are trying to put a good candidate in georgia. >> ifill: so democrats are hoping they get a revisitation of the luck they had last time which is the republicans choose badly. >> exactly. even in states where they are on

defense. democrats are definitely playing defense this year. they got to play a little offense in 2012, they're not so lucky this year. 2016 looks great for them if they want to wait that long. but they have to hope in a ple likelaska, for example, there could be a competitive primary where the quote/unquote wrong candidate comes out so that you get a situation by 2010 where the weaker candidate wins a republican primary giving a democrat a chance to hold a tough seat. >> ifill: if you are a second-term president about to enter the lagging days of your power and you are losing people in your party in the senate, what do you do about that? how does the president begin to position himself so that he's going to complete this advantage. he has all these big leacy-makingomesc issues lining up. >> well, he has to there's not much he can don't do about some of these. but for so many red state

democrats, this is the great irony, whether they're running as incumbent or for an open seat they'll spend their entire campaign running away from the spot you know they'd like in him is to not talk to them. to not make their lives that much harder. certainly gun vote was one vote many did not want to have to take and they're hoping there won't be that many more on the docket. >> ifill: is this just midterm politics as usual or this an unusually high level of defection? >> well, we have had a number of retirements in the past few cycles so this is this isn't that much out of the ordinary. my initial reaction was that it was and then i went back and looked and it is. but it's still important and this gets to the heart of your point. the outlook for the senate in 2014 starts to really kick in in terms of legislative politics in the senate at the end of this year and then certainly next year. if the reblics think "we're going to pick up four, five, maybe six senate seats we just have to hang in there, hang tough, not give the president

any victories and then he's going to have to deal with us after the senate that is going to change the dynamic and to the extent to which republicans are at all cooperative. if six months from now they're figuring they're going to gain seats, they'll be less cooperative. >> ifill: isn't there something good to be said about fresh blood. we keep saying people stay in washington too long. >> we each been saying that for a while and there's been talk about term limits being good to flush things out. if you look at the senate in 2015, at least 49 members of the senate would have been elected since 2008. if you look at the house, 40% of the house has been elected since 2010. there's been an incredit amount of turnover and what it has done is polarize it had congress more rather than bringing it toogt. >> ifill: oh, joy. with thank you both very much.

>> woodruff: next, from india, worries about the age-old bias favoring male children. special correspondent fred de sam lazaro updates a story he did a dozen years ago about the skewed sex ratio of children born in india. it's another in our agents of change series. >> reporter: for months, this 22-year-old mother of three has been coming to this crisis counseling center in a lower middle-class neighborhood of delhi. puja is trying to keep her family together. her husband and in laws have tried to throw her out. their problem? all three children are girls. >>. >> ( translated ): the family says they need sons to carry on their name and since i have only three daughters they tried to trick me into signing divorce papers so that their son could marry again. that led to some violence when i refused and i had to run away to

my mother's house for safety. >> reporter: the preference for boys goes back millennia. boys performed the last rites at their parents' funeral, they kayry the family name and when they marry they bring a dowry into the family. dowries were outlawed 50 years ago but they're pervasive and mistakenly believed to have roots in hindu scriptures says the delhi based center for social research. >> this was never a practice anywhere prescribed. i think it was said when the princess goes she must carry a number of horses because she's used to a certain level of comfort. so it is the duty of the king top ensure the daughter is given that. and that gets distorted now. even the poorest of the poor who can't afford two square meals a day will also have to buy things for them. >> reporter: in a rapidly

growing economy, daughters have become an increasing financial liability for their families says this sociologist. >> that don't want to pay dowries, they want to receive dowries. they want to give more education to the boys than to the girls because for the the boys are still more important. >> reporter: and the census shows indians are acting on that bias. for every 1,000 male infants born, there are just 914 females. in some regions, far fewer. in nature, those numbers are about equal. >> the gap began to wideen in the '90s with new ultrasound machines that made it easy to learn the fetus' sex. the scan led to the termination of millions of female pregnancies. in delhi, the center for social research has organized women into neighborhood groups trying to shift the ingrained gender bias, even invoking hinduism's goddess of prosperity. >> ( translated ): we must begin

to welcome girl babies into our homes, like the goddess lack shi has come into our home. lack smi. >> reporter: they're also aware of the law that's become known by its english acronym. that's the pre-conception and prenatal technology act, abortion is legal in india but the act makes it illegal when done for sex selection. >> a lot of people don't even know that we have a very strong law. if you, a, go for sex selection and also the doctor, the clinic, the radiologist can go to jail up to seven years. if they're caught doing it. in the minds of people that go for sex selection. >> reporter: however, absent extensive surveillance and sting operations-- and they have been absent-- it's difficult to police something that happens in the privacy of a doctor's

office. as one obstetrician told me in a newshour report on the same subject that i produced 12 years ago. this doctor candidly admitted he performs sex-selected abortions routinely. so you freely admit that you do basically contravene the law. >> yes, most of us do, i would say. i won't deny that. >> reporter: do you face any legal -- >> just what i said. there's nothing on paper. who can ask you? >> reporter: so despite the efforts of activists in the two decades since it was outlawed only 46 sex selection cases have been brought against medical practitioners but just one-- one single conviction. meanwhile, census figures show the practice has become even more prevalent. two decades ago it was maybe i will in the northern farm states whose green revolution had moved a lot of farmers into the middle-class. today that middle-class and lopsided gender ratio have spread widely.

>> places like uttar pred desh are becoming more prosperous where there will be greater availability of technology and more incomes in the hands of families, they will tend to shape the family and sex select. >> reporter: here's a huge irony: as these areas become more affluent, fertility rates-- the number of children born per woman-- are declining. that's good news, especially in some of india's most densely populated states. but when it comes to gender balance it's not good news. >> you know, when you want a smaller family then the squeeze is on the girls because, interestingly, suppose you're moving a family of four to three then you want two boys and one girl. so if a lot of families in populous states want two boys and one girl than obviously there's going to be a great excess of boys. >> reporter: she's seeing the consequences she says are already becoming visible in the northern farm states.

a shortage of brides is forcing men into marriage outside their communities. very awkward in a tradition-bound society. >> men in these states have been importing brides from, let's say, the east of india, the south of india. they're sort of going shopping for brides wherever they can. >> reporter: at the same time, she sees a slight improvement in the gender ratio in the states that saw skewed ones early on. she attributes this to growing affluence. >> once people reach the higher rungs of the middle-class when they go on to a stable middle-class, they don't sex select. then they tend to view girls and boys as being of eual value so they don't really care whether they have two girls, whether they have one girl; one boy, etc. >> reporter: she admits it will take many years and vast numbers making it into the stable middle-class to correct gender ratio. the center for social research's

kumari has also seen one development. more girls are going to school. >> india's full of contradictions. on the one side you see women in the villages still very disempowered but on the other side there's a brighter picture. we have largest number of doctors, lawyers, professionals, our education level is going up for the girls. women are filling the ranks in a very major way. >> reporter: this counseling center client says she wants an education for her daughters, that's why she's pursuing the uphill battle to stay married. >> ( translated ): women are progressing more in society and i need the support of their father so that they can grow up in a proper family, so that they can get a good education, so that they can grow up and have good marriages. >> reporter: the best dowry for a young bride she and many others say is an education. the attacks of september 11

sparked a revolution of sorts at >> woodruff: a version of fred's story aired on the pbs program "religion and ethics newsweekly." his reporting is a partnership with the undertold stories project at saint mary's university in minnesota. >> ifill: finally tonight, a new book about a major change in the way america fights. the attacks of september 11 sparked a revolution of sorts at the central intelligence agency, transforming it from an operation focused on stealing secrets to something closer to a paramilitary organization focused on hunting down and killing terrorists. the department of defense has evolved as well, beefing up its global intelligence gathering capabilities, and at times conducting missions that were previously done by the spies of the c.i.a. "new york times" national security correspondent mark mazzetti tracks all this in "the way of the knife: the c.i.a., a secret army, and a war at the end of the earth." margaret warner sat down with him recently, and began by asking when it first became apparent the line between spies and soldiers had blurred.

>> i started covering the military shortly before the september 11 attacks and in the months and years afterwards a lot of what i was reporting on was these efforts by rum rum and the defense secretary to basically get soldiers outside of the declared war zone, to basically send them around the world. and that meant changing not only the authorities that the pentagon had to do that but to build the budgets and build the capabilities of special operations troops. and rumsfeld was furious at the pentagon he inherited and wasn't equipped to fight this kind of war. so he was trying to push them more and more into intelligence gathering, man hunting in some now famous memos that rumsfeld wrote that sort of expressed his concern about these things and what we saw with the c.i.a. was weak after 9/11.

president bush gave the c.i. lethal authority to capture and kill al qaeda leaders which it hadn't had for decades so they become much more into the killing business and the military business. >> warner: now when did the c.i.a. -- they've started out capturing and interrogating terror suspects in these secret sites. when did they shift their focus and embrace the policy of targeting and killing them instead? >> there's a critical moment that i write about in 2004 when the c.i.a. inspector general writes a pretty devastating report about theabuses in the c.i.a. prison and really it had this effect not only within the agency but in the bush administration and ultimately congress, as we all know, the american public started learning the details. the first drone strike in pakistan took place a month after that report. now, i don't want to draw too direct a line and say one absolutely led to another but there's no question that this

report -- this internal report, led to help lead to a new direction for the c.i.a. from capturing the killer. >> warner: now, you write about this, t briefly describe what what sort of debate was there within either the agency or the administration about the morality and legality of using drones to essentially carry out remote control assassinations? >> you had a whole generation of c.i.a. officers who had come in to the agency after the 1970s church committee investigation which is many people will remember sort of aired all the dirty laundry about assassination attempts, coupe attempts in the c.i.a.. so many thought the c.i.a. should not be doing this in terms of handling armed drones so. then, of course, 9/11 happened. president bush gives the lethal authority and there were concerns that played out before 9/11 that were quickly swept aside. but it did take some time for the c.i.a. really to escalate

its killing operation even after 9/11 attacks. some of it was because, as you said, there was this interrogation focus but it was also their intelligence wasn't particularly good in order to do these drone strikes. they had to broker secret deals with these countriesn order to allow them to have the strike and then finally the big moment was at the end of the bush administration president bush decides that he's going to authorize the c.i.a. to do drone strikes in pakistan unilaterally without even telling the pakistanis because he had reached a point of frustration. >> woodruff: you write -- >> warner: you write about a number of the downsides and one of the most important ones you found is that all this focus on targeting finding specific terrorists took them away from the traditional work in which they might understand developments throughout the muslim world, let's say the arab spring, for example, the intelligence agencies missed. >> when the arab spring happened after the initial spark that

hearing impaireded in tunisia that set up the tunisian revolt you had these kas chrading revolutions in egypt, in libya, and there's a lot of concern in the administration that the agency was a step behind all along the way. one of the things i write about in the book is that when you're doing man huntingand counterterrorism you're necessarily going to be very close with foreign spy services. they're going to help you find terror leaders or militants so your close with the egyptians but those are the last people who will going to tell you that there's a revolution on its way in the country. >> warner: even if they know. >> even if they know they might not tell the c.i.a.. so the question was how much the c.i.a. or other intel agencies didn't have the feet on the ground to predict these revolts as they were happening. >> warner: john brennan seemed to indicate at his hearing that he wanted to dial back on the

drone -- having the agency and the drone attack business. do you think there is going to be a shift? if, so why? >> i think that the pressure is increasing on president obama to bring more transparency to these operations. they remain in secret and it's amazing that even some members of the intelligence committees who have access to the highest classification information in the u.s. government they realized that they didn't have everything and they were pushing for more information. so there's pressure to at least bring more transparency and brennan has said that there is there are fungsz it is c.i.a. is doing that it shouldn't be doing. i think this is going to be something that takes time now that the c.i.a. wouldn't necessarily entirely get out of the targeted killing business it may give up aspects of it. and then the question is well, how long does it take the agency

to be ming back in the other rection? it could take years but there's no question that the secrecy of all this is is something that i don't think president obama and the obama administration the going to be able to maintain for very long. >> warner: mark mazzetti, thank you for joining us and i look forward to continuing our conversation about "the way of the knife" online. >> thanks very much. >> ifill: as margaret said, there is more of their conversation online, and you can find that on the rundown. >> woodruff: finally tonight, america's retirement system and the growing problems it poses for future generations. that's the subject of tonight's frontline, "the retirement gamble." correspondent martin smith looks at what was behind the shift to private plans known as 401(k)'s, the role of the financial services industry, and why too many americans have too little in savings. here's an excerpt about the plight of one worker and what he is facing.

>> robert tilton smith entered the work force in 200 he taught far bit, worked at a coffee shop and then went to grad school where he ran up $40,000 in student loans. but on the bright side, he had no savings to lose during the 2008 crash. when he graduated with a master niece economics he was hired at a small think tank in new york. they had a 401k and he began to make regular contributions. but even in a relatively good market, he began to sense that something else was wrong. >> i have a01(k aven it. it hasn't seemed to go up. it's awful. i kept checking the statement i'd be like "why does this thing never go up? this is weird." i mean, the stock market i knew was up and down but i was like i still should be seeing some returns. >> reporter: hilton smith

decided to make a research project out of the subject. he began by looking at the investment options inside his 401(k) plan-- 22 funds in all. >> you know, you've got all these names and the names tell you nothing. it's a balance fund. it's a groh fund. okay. ye th's ligo for certain kind of broad investment strategy but really what the heck? so i went through each of the actual fund prospectuss, which took me an exorbitant amount of time. each of these things were, you know, 50 pages long. they still wouldn't tell you what they were doing. >> reporter: as he dug deeper, he discovered one fund invested in mortgage-backed securities-- the kind of security that caused the collapse of the housing market. but that's not what worried him. >> i was digging into all the different aspects of it and i kept coming back to fees. so here's the first mention of fees, x ratio right here.

why would you think that x ratio means fees? >> reporter: hilton smith found over a dozen different kind of fees including asset management fees, trading fees, marketing fees, recordkeeping fees and administrative fees. >> fees when you draw money, fees when you take loans, fees wh you get mon when you're retire which had i didn't know about. i spent a month going oh, this fee is a subtype of this fee and oh, that covers that. no, that's another name for that. it was very opaque. >> reporter: the average actively managed mutual fund carries an annual expense of 1.3%. some funds charge a fee of 2%. and even as high as 5%. >> that may not seem very much, right? yoknow, you've g $50000 or $100,000 and okay so you lose

$500 or you lose $1,000. that's what you would pay to a financial advisor, right? but if you add that up over 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 years in a 401(k) plan, all of a sudden you're well into the six figures as your balance grows. and that's the difference between running out of money before you die or having a little money left to pass on to yourarys. >> ifill: ray suarez talked to frontline's martin smith about his own 401(k) mishaps. find that conversation on our web site. >> ifill: again, the major developments of the day, authoriti said the surviving suspect in the boston bombings has admitted he did play a role in the attacks, and they believe he and his brother acted alone. the mississippi man accused of sending ricin-tainted letters to the president and a senator, was released. and wall street rallied after a brief plunge when a fake "tweet" reported explosions at the white house. the dow industrials gained more than 150 points.

>> woodruff: online we look at the guantanamo bay detention center by the numbers. hari sreenivasan explains. >> sreenivasan: how big is it the facility, and how many detainees are there? those are among statistics we offer. plus revisit a photo essay about conditions inside where more than half the prisoners are on hunger strikes. and expert headhunter nick corcodilos writes about transitioning careers from the military to civilian work. that's on our making sense page. all that and more is on our web site, newshour.pbs.org. judy? >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. on wednesday, we talk with ken feinberg. he'll manage the $20 million fund to help boston marathon bombingictims and their families. i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill. we'll see you online, and again here tomorrow evening. thank you, and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> bnsf railway.

>> and by the alfred p. sloan foundation. supporting science, technology, and improved economic performance and financial literacy in the 21st century. >> and witthe oning support of these institutions and foundations. and... >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by macneil/lehrer productions captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org